Teaching at summer camps to gain experience?

Carol

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A friend of mine is an assistant instructor at a school in New England. She also an adjunct (part-time) professor at a local college;

With the blessing of both her head instructor and her college boss, she'll be taking the summer off from both jobs and teaching at various youth summer camps hither and yon. I know she'll be going to several camps around the country...I think she may even have a trip planned to the UK and Spain.

When I asked her about her travels she mentioned that it would be a great way for her to show her young daughter more of the country. I'm guessing it is also an answer to the awkward matter of summer child care for a single parent.

But I've known for awhile that she has a desire to do more martial arts teaching, perhaps even opening up her own school someday. Do you think this is a good way to gain additional experience? I think its a rather intriguing way to try new things.....but I'm also not an instructor.

What do you think?
 

Blindside

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Sounds like a great option. Obviously it be repetition in teaching the very fundamentals and it could get frustrating never being able to take a student beyond a week of training, much of the reward of being an instructor is watching students put what you taught them together. She will probably never really get to see that in this situation. But sure, you need experience to be a good teacher, this will give her more experience than she has now.
 

JR 137

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The most important thing to be gained from it IMO is the different personalities she'll encounter. Ever person is different and therefore learns differently. Teaching the same group over and over again, you get into a routine of what "works." That's all fine and good until you meet someone who completely breaks that mould. Instead of seeing a few dozen different MAs, she'll see hundreds.

Then there's the personalities and abilities of fellow instructors/counselors. She'll see a lot of different ways of trying to accomplish the same goal. Things such as verbal cues, when they're appropriate, which ones are and aren't appropriate, etc. She'll probably see a bunch of new drills too, which will add to her repertoire.

Sounds like a great opportunity.
 

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